Mind If I Read Your Mind? (9 page)

Monday morning came all too soon. And there was still no sign of the Hoove.

Billy was a bundle of nerves. He hung over the sink in the boys' bathroom, splashing cold water on his face. As he pulled a paper towel from the dispenser and patted his face dry, he checked the clock on the wall. Ten minutes to ten. He was supposed to be in the auditorium, helping Ruby and Ricardo make their name tags and set up their chairs on the stage, but he had excused himself to go to the bathroom for the fourth time in the last half hour.

“Man, you must have had a lot of liquids at breakfast,” Ricardo had commented.

“You can't be too careful when you have to appear in public,” Billy answered. “You don't want any lakes appearing where there shouldn't be lakes … if you catch my drift.”

“Can I just say I don't and leave it at that?”

Billy instantly wished he hadn't said what he said. Of course, Ricardo didn't want to discuss his peeing situation. No one would. But what else could he have said to explain his behavior? That his personal ghost — the one who was responsible for his mind-reading trick — was a no-show? That he had nothing ready to take its place? That he was going to let his team down in front of the whole school? No, making repeated trips to the bathroom seemed a much better solution.

Billy's heart raced as he stood at the sink visualizing the auditorium filling with all four hundred of Moorepark's students. He imagined the team from Ms. Winter's sixth-grade class setting up their chairs on the opposite side of the stage. He saw the three teachers acting as judges checking the sound system, and Mr. Wallwetter pacing back and forth, his skinny mustache soaking wet with anxious perspiration.

All Billy could do was blot his T-shirt with paper towels to clean up the water that had missed his face. He knew there was no turning back. He was just going to have to go out there and face the consequences, whatever they were. He turned off the water and breathed deeply. Suddenly, the pipes rumbled as if something was stuck inside.

Oh, great
, Billy thought.
As if this day isn't bad enough, now I'm going to be the center of a plumbing emergency.

The pipes continued to vibrate, growing louder and louder until it seemed like the sink was going to break loose from the wall. Billy fidgeted with the cold faucet, trying desperately to get the noise to stop. It was then he heard it — a distant whistling that seemed to be coming from inside the spout.

No, it couldn't be.

But it was.

As Billy stared at the faucet, a plaid news-boy cap with a button on top emerged from the spout, streaming out like liquid smoke. After the cap came a face. After the face came suspenders, and after the suspenders came brown leather boots laced up to the ankle. Finally, an entire Hoover Porterhouse III oozed out of the faucet and stood upright in the sink, a moist smile plastered on his face.

“I am here,” he said, snapping his suspenders with a cocky grin.

“You came through the pipes?”

“That I did, and I might add, with extreme flair. The Hoove's Rule Number Fifty-Five. Seize the room and command the crowd with your entrance.”

“Hoove, no one's here. It's just you and me … and the toilet.”

“Billy Boy, there are no small rooms, only small entrances.”

The Hoove jumped out of the sink and checked himself out in the mirror, slicking back his handsome head of hair. He was all smiles, acting like nothing was wrong. His casual attitude made Billy furious.

“I can't believe you just vanished on me,” Billy snapped. “I've been so worried I haven't been able to sleep or eat, except for last night when my appetite came back a little because the bacon was really good.”

“Understood. I've always loved a good strip of bacon myself.”

“Listen, Hoove, I'm sorry about going to Dodger Stadium without you, but you didn't have to go disappear on me. I've been a nervous wreck. Where have you been?”

“Never mind where
I've
been,” the Hoove said, laying a cold hand on Billy's shoulder. “Calm yourself down, my friend, and think about where
you're
going. Out on that stage to wow them.”

“I can't wow anyone. We haven't rehearsed. We don't even know if the mind-reading thing is going to work again.”

“Get serious, Billy Boy. Do I look like an entity that ever rehearsed in his life? I'm a natural at the supernatural.”

There was a knock on the bathroom door, and Ricardo stuck his head in.

“Hey, dude, you all right in here?” he asked. “I thought I heard conversation.”

“Um … I was just rehearsing,” Billy said. “I'm fine, Ricardo. I just need another few minutes to go over my stuff.”

“I can't give 'em to you,” Ricardo said. “Wallwetter told me to come get you right away. Let's go.”

“As in now?”

“Why, you got other plans?”

“Tell him we're ready,” the Hoove told Billy. “Go ahead. Look confident.”

“I'm … I'm … I'm ready,” Billy stammered.

“Excuse me,” the Hoove interrupted. “I believe I said
we're
ready!”

Ricardo was already out the door. Checking himself in the mirror one last time, Billy smoothed his lumpy hair as best he could and followed Ricardo out into the hall. The Hoove was right behind him.

As they approached the auditorium, Billy thought he heard a hive of buzzing bees inside. The entire sixth, seventh, and eighth grades were talking and laughing and waiting restlessly for the competition to start. Billy walked down the aisle and up the wooden stairs onto the stage. Ruby was already seated, her name tag hanging around her neck. Ricardo sat down next to her, and Billy took the remaining seat. Ms. Winter's team was busily going over their notes on the other side of the stage. The Hoove floated to the center and took a deep bow.

“Too bad you guys can't see me,” he called out to the audience, “because I'm about to perform the perfect moonwalk.”

In his day, the Hoove had been a terrific dancer, and during his time as a ghost, he had learned all the popular dances of the last hundred years. He could do the Charleston, the jitterbug, the tango, the twist, the mashed potato, and even the funky chicken. What he loved best was the moonwalk. When he did it, it seemed like he was floating on air (which technically he was). As he began his perfect moonwalk across the stage, the Hoove shot a glance over at Billy.

“I know what you're thinking,” he said. “That old Hoover Porterhouse can bust a move.”

And with that, he moonwalked down the stairs and up the aisle, coming to a stop next to the seat occupied by Rod Brownstone. Just for fun, he blew in Brownstone's right ear. Rod promptly turned to Spencer Robinson, a muscular eighth grader who was sitting to the right of him, and slugged him in the arm.

“What'd you do that for?” Spencer snapped, pulling himself up to his full height. “Actually, Brownstone, I don't care what you did it for. If you do it again, I'm going to paper clip your lips together.”

Rod backed off right away, flashing Spencer a timid grin and dropping the subject immediately. Like all bullies, Brownstone was a coward at heart and as soon as he was challenged, he sunk down into the cushion of his auditorium seat.

Mr. Wallwetter tapped on the microphone to get the assembly's attention and began the introduction of his team. As he spoke, the Hoove floated around the auditorium looking for the person whose mind he was going to read. After much consideration, he settled on Tess Wu, who was texting from a phone hidden in the folds of her purse so that the teachers couldn't see it. The Hoove looked over her shoulder and saw that she was telling Ava Daley about a new pair of purple and silver running shoes she was going to buy that day.

“This will work nicely,” he shouted out to Billy. “When I give you the signal, you tell them she's thinking about buying purple and silver running shoes. I'll give you more details as I get them.”

By that time, Mr. Wallwetter had finished his introductions. Ms. Winter took the microphone to introduce her team, which consisted of Emily Yamaguchi, Samir Shah, and Paul Costello. Ms. Winter announced that Emily would demonstrate how to make an origami bird out of a dollar bill. Samir would demonstrate how to bend a stream of water using static electricity. And the final presentation would be Paul Costello demonstrating his wheelchair basketball skills.

“We've got some stiff competition,” Ruby whispered.

“No worries,” Ricardo said, throwing an arm around Billy. “We got the B Bomb here. No one's going to beat him.”

Billy silently thanked his lucky stars that the Hoove had shown up in time. Without him, the B Bomb would have fizzled out like a two-weekold can of soda. Billy looked nervously into the audience and was relieved to see the Hoove busily checking out Tess's phone messages. She was watching the stage and didn't notice her phone drifting slightly above her purse.

“Getting all the goods on her,” the Hoover called out. “Trust me, we are going to amaze and delight. This trophy is in the bag … of that you can be sure.”

The teachers flipped a coin to determine which team would go first, and Ms. Winter's team won. Emily Yamaguchi and her origami dollar bill bird were up first. She did a good demonstration of something that was obviously hard to do. After she finished, the three judges each held up a paddle with a number from one to ten. Emily got all sevens. The judges said that they had to take points off because she said
um
and
like
too much.

Ruby went next, and although she was extremely flexible while demonstrating her warm-up exercises, she completely toppled over during one of her lunges. She wasn't hurt, and after taking a few seconds to collect herself, she stood back up and finished her routine. The judges gave her two eights and a nine. The eights were because she had fallen and the nine was for having the poise to get back up and finish her routine.

When Ruby took her seat, Billy and Ricardo gave her high fives.

“At least I got us in the lead.” She shrugged.

“Even if I did lunge sideways.” Then, in typical Ruby fashion, she laughed. Billy was in awe of her self-confidence, that she could fall over in front of everyone and not be even the slightest bit embarrassed. He wondered if he would ever believe in himself that much.

Next, Samir and Ricardo went head-to-head. Samir spoke first and demonstrated how the static electricity from a balloon that had been rubbed on a sweater could bend a stream of water. But his experiment didn't work because he rubbed the balloon too hard and it popped before he could hold it up to the water. Luckily, he had a plastic comb in his pocket, and when he rubbed that on his sweater, it did the trick. The trickle of water bent toward the comb. Unluckily, Samir had forgotten to clean the hair out of his plastic comb, and when he was finished with the experiment, his white sweater had some serious strands of black hair traveling down the front. He got two eights and one seven from the judges. Two of the judges felt that he knew his science, but he didn't project his voice to the back of the room. The third judge didn't explain her score of seven, but chances were she objected to the hair party on his sweater.

Ricardo had a strong start to his carrot and raisin salad demonstration. Unfortunately, he got some points taken off for dropping a clump of mayonnaise on the floor and then cracking up about it. When Ricardo started to laugh onstage, Billy glanced over at Mr. Wallwetter in the wings and could practically see smoke coming out of his ears. He was fuming.

“Maintain your composure,” he hissed at Ricardo. “There is nothing funny about spilled mayonnaise.”

Ricardo managed to finish his speech without cracking up again, but his eyes kept watering the way they do when you're trying to stifle a laugh. He scored two sevens and a nine. To no one's surprise, the nine was from Coach Johnston of the baseball team, who may have been a little biased in favor of his best home-run hitter. That made Ricardo's score twenty-three, the same as Samir's. Mr. Wallwetter's team was four points in the lead.

Ms. Winter announced that since the score was close, the winner of the competition was probably going to be determined by the last two contestants — Paul Costello and Billy Broccoli. She was looking forward to seeing how these two contestants would perform under such pressure.

Paul Costello went first. Billy hadn't met him yet, because they didn't have any classes together, but he knew that Paul was a friend of Breeze's. All Breeze had told him was that Paul was a really nice guy and that he had been in a wheelchair most of his life because of a lower spinal cord injury.

Paul rolled his chair up to the microphone and asked Ms. Winter to take it away. Then he took a headset from his lap and slid it around his head. It had a thin wire microphone that led to his mouth, allowing him to speak and be heard without using his hands.

“A lot of you might think that people in wheelchairs are limited,” he said to the kids in the auditorium. “I'm here to demonstrate that our limits are only in our mind. I've always wanted to play basketball, and I wasn't going to let this chair stop me. So please watch and enjoy as I demonstrate wheelchair basketball skills.”

Billy could feel the crowd moving to the edge of their seats. Even Ricardo leaned forward, eager to see what Paul could do.

“I'll start off with basic wheelchair movements such as the forward and backward push, the turn, the pivot, and the tilt,” Paul began. “Then I'll show you a bounce pass and a chest pass. And I'll end with a few different dribbles I've perfected over the years.”

What followed was a dazzling display of athletic prowess. Paul moved his wheelchair up and down the stage with lightning speed. It was like it had a motor, only the motor was his two hands on the wheels. He moved with such grace and hustle that the audience almost forgot he was confined to a chair. As he pivoted and tilted, he explained how he used his hands and his torso to propel himself and maintain his balance.